Friday, May 25, 2012

Unified
process is another process in the list of the iterative and
incremental processes apart from the agile processes. There are so many
refinements and variations of the unified process as mentioned below:

RUP or Rational Unified Process: A refinement of the
Unified process developed by the IBM/rational software.

RUP- SE or Rational Unified Process - System Engineering: This is a version of the rational unified process developed by the
rational software for catering to the needs of the system engineering.

AUP or Agile unified process: It is a lightweight
variation that was developed by Scott W. Ambler.

OpenUP or Open unified process:It is the eclipse
process frame work software development process.

BUP or Basic unified process: It is also a lightweight
variation but developed by the IBM. It is kind of a precursor to Open UP.

EssUP or Essential unified process: Another light weight
variation developed by the Ivar Jacobson.

EUP or enterprise unified process: It is an extension of
the RUP or the rational unified process.

OUM or oracle unified method: A development and
implementation process developed by the oracle.

So you
see that the agile unified process is a refinement of the unified process! So
what is the difference between the two? This is what we have discussed in the
article. Actually there is a subtle difference between the two in the way that
they categorize the project work flows and the disciplines.

Disciplines addressed by RUP

There are nine
disciplines that are addressed by the rational unified process as mentioned
below:

Business modelling

Requirements

Analysis and design

Implementation

Test

Deployment

Configuration and change management

Environment

Project management

9
disciplines is a big count! The agile refinements of the unified process
simplify the whole rational unified process further and reduce the above
mentioned nine disciplines to a lesser count making the whole development
process simple and short.

Points of Comparison between RUP and AUP

- Unified process though being quite an advance process
for developing the software but it provides quite a heavy approach. On the
other hand the agile unified processes are quite light.

- These processes provide
a way of streamlining the rational unified process by minimizing the number of
the expected artifacts and simplify the whole work flow.

- The UP and the AUP
also vary in their specifications of what happens after the completion of the
transition phase.

- In the agile unified processes, the transition phase is
followed by a production phase rather than by a new inception phase in the case
of the unified process.

- There are countless numbers of the unified process
refinements and variations.

-There are 4 phases in a unified process
namely:

Inception phase

Elaboration phase

Construction

Transition

In addition to the above 4 mentioned phases, the agile unified processes go through the two additional phases namely: 1. The retirement phase and 2. The Production phase.

The below mentioned are the
philosophies up on which the agile processes are based:

The development knows what is being done.

Simplicity is maintained.

The whole process confirms to the principles and values
of the agile software.

Focus is on high value activities.

It is tool independent.

The
agile unified process makes use of two types of iterations namely:

Development release iteration: deployment to the quality
assurance and